The Impact of Moral Injury and Moral Horror: Trauma Informed Treatment Strategies

Moral injury refers to the psychological, emotional, and spiritual distress that arises when individuals witness, perpetrate, or are unable to prevent actions that violate deeply held moral or ethical beliefs. While initially described in military contexts, moral injury has increasing relevance for civilians, particularly clinicians, caregivers, educators, and community members navigating ongoing exposure to systemic injustice, violence, and collective trauma. This presentation examines moral injury within the context of contemporary social and political stressors, emphasizing its intersection with trauma, burnout, and moral distress in both clinical and community settings. Distinct from posttraumatic stress disorder, moral injury is characterized by shame, guilt, anger, grief, loss of trust, and existential rupture, often accompanied by a profound sense of betrayal by institutions or systems meant to protect. Drawing from trauma-informed, narrative, and relational frameworks, this session explores how moral injury manifests in clients and providers, including heightened emotional reactivity, withdrawal, hopelessness, and impaired meaning-making.

What will the audience take away from your presentation? 

The presentation includes clinical strategies for addressing moral injury such as collective meaning-making, validation of moral emotions, restoration of agency, and practices that support moral repair.
Participants will learn to move beyond individual pathology and toward healing honoring ethical integrity, collective resilience, and sustained engagement in care.
Particular attention is given to clinicians and researchers working with children and families affected by structural violence, forced separations, and chronic exposure to injustice, and the resulting ethical strain experienced by helpers.

To be updated shortly..